(Closed) Engagement Nightmare. Help.

If you read my last post, you’ll know that several months ago I was having a hissy fit over not being engaged (silly me), and starting to focus more on myself. Well after reconnecting with my guy and figuring out what we really wanted, we ended up engaged. Crazy right? Silly fussy me getting what I wanted. I was overjoyed, and now we’ve been saving every penny to pay for the wedding in November.

But there’s a catch. I got to celebrate my engagement for about ten minutes (those minutes spent alone with my guy), before I decided to tell my parents. Their reaction? My mother sort of passed it off as if I’d just told her I’d bought a new pair of underwear, my dad said nothing. My older sister said something to the effect of “I’m sick, I don’t feel like dealing with this right now.”. Trying to be polite, I went ahead and called my grandmother before I announced it via Facebook, and she said “you’re out of your damn mind.” Sure she apologized the next day, but the damage was done. Thankfully on Facebook people seemed happy and excited for us. Since then, my extended family treat my engagement as some terrible secret they like to keep in the dark. Or occassionally gossip about it.

Any mention of my wedding is thrown in my face. My family gets incredibly annoyed just because I’m excited about getting married. In arguements, they say hurtful things about my wedding that has absolutely nothing to do with the arguement. When I told my older sister I’d love for her to be my maid of honor, she just laughed at me. I wanted to throw an engagement party for myself in an attempt to be happy for the occassion, but my family tore that down too. So I decided just to celebrate with my bridesmaids and groomsmen. After switching the dates about 3 times for them, only one of my bridesmaids could make it. My sister didn’t feel like going, one didn’t want to spend the money to visit, one had a play she had to go to. Only one bridesmaid could go (I assume since I hadn’t heard from her either). My SO and I were paying for everything, even providing rides. We decided not to have the party.

I made the mistake of wanting to go dress shopping with my mom. Again, any mention of such a thing annoys her. She promised to go and look at dresses in December, but never did. When I asked her when we could go dress shopping (that November) she told me the only time she could go was when she was on break. Her break fell around my dad’s birthday. She said she “didn’t want that ‘mess’ (dress shopping’ to taint” my dad’s birthday. Again, I was paying for the dress. Not her. So I don’t understand why just spending a few hours with me is such a big deal.

Several family members make me feel bad for not wanting my half-sister to be a bridesmaid. My half-sister and I have no relationship, and are frankly not on good terms. My mom has forced me to make her bridesmaid anyway.

Anytime I try to talk to other people about my wedding, say for one person who is pushing for us to just get married by the JOP, always turns it into a conversation about what THEY want for their weddings. These girls aren’t engaged. I listen to my older sister rant and rave about her boy troubles, but she won’t give me the time of day to hear about my plans. She claims that I’m “idolizing” my wedding/marriage.

At this point I’m beaten down and totally exhausted. I”m considering just eloping or postponing it indefinitely so I can recover. Maybe I deserve all this. What should I do? What would any of you do? Are they justified? Sorry for the long post and all the ranting. I’m at the end of my rope. Please help.

@ohmygiggles: I would elope. In fact, we are going to elope. My family doesn’t sound as bad as yours, but any suggestions I’ve made have met w. resistance, and my mom certainly isn’t excited about anything like dress shopping.

I don’t see how a big wedding would be a joyous occasion for you… so why waste the money? It’ll only be drama, stress, and thousands of dollars gone.

I agree with PP, you should elope. If they don’t want to be part of your wedding, you shouldn’t want them to be. But even if you decide not to elope, I would ABSOLUTELY NOT postpone your wedding. Don’t give them the satisfaction.

I know it’s hard and you’d like them to be involved, but clearly they are dragging you down. I had to learn the same lesson as you did and I just try to remember that your wedding and all the details are only important to you.

Since you don’t have your family’s support, divide the tasks you need to accomplish by importance between you and your FI, and then just check them off one by one and DON’T skip ahead of the list! Its what I’ve done, since I’m pretty much doing this by myself too, and I haven’t been overwhelmed so far.

@ohmygiggles: I would elope too! When it comes down to it, I think that the most important thing is that you marry the person you love. Use that money on a nice honeymoon or something. You can still wear a beautiful wedding dress if you want to. I’m sorry your family feels this way though, but it seems like they will not be happy no matter what you do.

BTW, if you do choose to elope, there are a TON of cute B&Bs in NC that have elopement packages. I would elope if I had the choice – FI wants a weddng .

@ohmygiggles: I’m so sorry that your family is making this exciting time in your life miserable. It seems as though they are incapable of embracing your wedding, so I think you should elope, or just invite your bridal party (the ones that you like.. not your half sister) to be witnesses.

Another option is to plan an evening with your close (read: supportive) friends, and surprise them with a wedding. It wouldn’t be too expensive, and you’d get to wear a beautiful dress, eat, and dance the night away.

Bottom line: it’s your wedding. Do what you want, and only what makes you and your FI happy!

HOpe you’re OK with the eloping thing because I would suggest it, as well. Based on your previous post, it sounds like the wild ride he sent you on caused you to send mixed messages to your family about him (I assume you went to them for support). If the only mention your mom makes of your wedding is complaining about who’s in it or not, she doesn’t deserve to be with you during this time.

Get your wedding back to its roots — the two of you and spend your money on a bomb ass honeymoon!

Wow!!! I would elope also!! Have fun, insted of EVERYONE taering you to pieces… YOU DON’T DESERVE THAT!! I know it can be hard to deal with family but it seems like they dont even give a rats ass about you and your feelings on yourwedding day. You need to be happy 🙁 I would save the money from your wedding elope and go on an even funner honeymoon. Then when they ask why you eloped, just say “you made me do it.” period, and let them reflect on themselves.

I think the first thing you should do is to sit down with your mom first and discuss with her why she is not being supportive. Whatever she says, try to see things from her perspective. As a mom and likely concerned for you and your well being.

Then work with those worries she expresses and rationally try to to resolve each one.

Be sure to tell her how much you want her involved in the wedding or at the minimum happy for you because this is what you want.

Instead of going straight to the “You are going to act this way, then I am going to punish you/do this” Look for the root of the problem. It not only may be fixable, but it could make your life much better post marriage. Because if she is not supportive now, it may take a very long time for her to become supportive.

I feel like I must be missing some part of this story to explain your family’s horrible reaction. How long have you two been together? Why are they so unsupportive; have they always been this way? Do they have some reason to dislike your fiance? How is his family reacting to all of this?

Jeez, I’d just go elope. Screw them. I wouldn’t want them there at all if that’s the way they’re going to treat you. One didn’t want to go to your wedding because they would rather go see a play???! Are you kidding me?! I wouldn’t change my date for something like that. How will they react when you get pregnant? (Assuming you want kids). This is a sucky situation. I really feel for you.

I havne’t read your other post but in this one you mentioned “reconnecting” with your guy. I’m assuming that means you were having problems/stress in the relationship. Did you complain a lot to your family during that time about your now FI? If you were unhappy in the relationhsip and complaining about it, and they saw that, they might be unhappy about hte engagement because of these past troubles.